


New

by Elenhin



Category: The Almighty Johnsons
Genre: Gen, hand me downs
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-12-03
Updated: 2013-12-03
Packaged: 2018-01-03 08:46:58
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,490
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1068465
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Elenhin/pseuds/Elenhin
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>This is another challenge given to me by the generous and talented, and did I mention generous? Aramirandme81</p>
<p>It is from the One Word at a Time series, a sort of digging deeper into one of the lines. </p>
<p>The word was New, the line was; Growing up only wearing hand me down’s is bad enough, especially when you even have to wear your younger brothers, so as soon as Anders is on his own and has a job, he wows to never buy second hand again.</p>
            </blockquote>





	New

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Aramirandme81](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Aramirandme81/gifts).



> Again, I want to say thank you for encouraging me so generously to do this, And I hope you enjoy it,

New

 

“I thought I was getting a new jacket,” Anders pouts as he looks at the garment in his hand.

 

“Yes, you’ve grown out of your old one,” his mum confirms.

 

“So I am getting a new one?” he asks hopefully. Perhaps this is only for the moment, only until he can get his jacket.

 

“Yes, Anders,” she sighs. “I told you you’ve grown out of your jacket, and I found you that one instead. Now put it on and stop fussing. I have to get Ty ready.”

 

“But this is Mike’s jacket,” Anders can feel his lower lip trembling with bitter disappointment.

 

“Mike grew out of it years ago, now stop this whining this instant,” she grabs the small jacket she had bought for Ty, the three year old eagerly holding up his arms so she can help him put it on.

 

“But Mike’s old jacket isn’t a new one, it’s an old one,” Anders might be only six, but he knows the difference between a new jacket and an old one. The new jacket is not stained or worn in patches. It doesn’t say ‘Mike Johnson’ with a laundry marker on the collar. There are no holes in the pockets of a new jacket.

 

“Anders!” she snaps, slapping his cheek and then putting her index finger in his face. “Put it on now before I lose my patience with you.”

 

Anders puts it on, but can’t manage he stubborn zipper. He can’t quite fight back the tears though but he’s not really mad at mum, or Ty. Ty has a new jacket that mum bought for him. Ty is just a baby though, and he needs good clothes so he does not get sick or anything. Anders hates always getting Mike’s old clothes but he’s kinda glad for Ty’s sake. He’s just just mad at himself for letting himself believe that a new jacket would be a new jacket.  

 

Putting on Mike’s old sneakers, with a hole in the toe, Anders bites his lip. He knows what it means when their mum say there’s no money for new shoes. She does sometimes get him new shoes becuase once Mike are done with his they are never much good. Normally they are always too big for him, but this time his toe is already poking through the hole and they pinch the side of his foot. The worst part is that his old still fit. Mum bought them with room to grow in, and there was still a little room left but they got ruined.

 

She had been quite mad about that, and it would be a month before he got dessert again. She did sigh sadly when she realized Mike’s old shoes was for once a little too small for him, but Mike to will need new shoes soon. She said she would buy him new ones at the end of the month, and Anders will get the ones he’s wearing now while they are still good. That is what mum calls a compromise.

 

When there is nothing suitable that Mike has grown out of she takes him to the store with clothes that other kids has grown out of. You buy clothes with stains and holes already in them there and he hates it. Two pair of jeans and three shirts, but then she takes him to a store with new clothes. Clothes that no one else has had before and she buys him a t-shirt.

 

Walking out of the store Anders hugs it to his chest, a new t-shirt, bought just for him. He does not complain about the jeans or the shirts then. The t-shirt sort of makes up for them being old and used.

 

By now he is also pretty much resigned to the fact that new clothes for him just means it’s not Mike who had them before but someone else.

 

Sometimes he’s been glad to have Mike’s old clothes, and sometimes Mike can be really nice. Like when he got to chose between two different jackets for the winter.

 

“This one,” he held it up and showed their mother who nodded.

 

“I think the other one suited you better,” she stated.

 

“Maybe, but I don’t really care, and Anders liked this one better. He’ll get it after me, so it’s only fair,” Mike shrugged and Anders found himself staring at his brother with his mouth hanging open.

 

Sometimes Mike was the best big brother in the world.

 

Mike always grew very quickly, he ate a lot and put on inches almost visibly. Anders on the other hand grew slowly and was sick a lot so he never wanted to eat much. Then Ty started growing too. Ander is three years older, but Ty grows a lot faster so suddenly they have to share the clothes that Mike has grown out of. Mum will put it in a pile, and they can pick what they want. Mostly Anders lets Ty take anything he wants, hoping there will be nothing left for him and mum will buy him something else but it never works. She just shakes her head, puts it back in the pile and they have to start over. Sometimes she’ll buy Ty something new, saying it’s not easy to inherit after two brothers and Ty too deserve to have something new.

 

Then the worse thing happens, suddenly Ty is the one who gets the clothes after Mike, and he gets them after Ty. Ty is bigger than him now.

 

Not by very much though, so by the time Ty is through with them they’re too small for him. He hates it, he really hates it.

 

When Valerie comes with an armful of Axl’s old clothes that she wants him to wear Anders refuses.

 

There’s a glorious argument between the two of them that ends with Valerie giving him a hard slap across the cheek and Anders storming out of the house. He manages to get his hands on some alcohol and when Mike finally finds him he’s drunk. Something that Mike does not appreciate at all and he can’t really blame him. Having to deal with a very drunk brother most of the night when you have to work the next day, no, Anders do not blame him at all for being mad.

 

At least Mike is more understanding and sympathetic about the clothes. He makes it very clear that Anders acted childishly and inappropriately, but he also agrees that Valerie handled it the wrong way. Axl’s outgrown clothes has been bought for him, and the style is very much Axl and not Anders at all. Axl might like the idea of skulls and motorcycles on his t-shirts, but Anders do not.

 

The shorts that went past the knee on Axl are supposed to be a bit baggy and looks okay on him, but when Anders puts them on Mike shakes his head.

 

“I see your point,” he muses. On Axl they were baggy, on Anders they hang like a sack just barely staying up by means of a belt. They are supposed to end just below the knee but instead they end halfway down his calves. The neckline of the t-shirt sag and wants to slip off his shoulder. Half the print disappears into the waistline of the shorts if he tucks it in, and it hangs too far down his thighs if he does not which makes it look like a dress. “You need to grow into that.”

 

“That’s not funny!” Anders snaps, pulling them off and throwing them down to the floor.

 

“Hey, take it easy,” Mike sighs.

 

“I’m sick of always getting everyone elses hand me downs,” Anders declares. “Your’s, Ty’s And Axl’s. I’m sick of it.”

 

“Anders, we don’t have much money for new clothes,” his brother sighs. “You know that.”

 

“There was enough to get that for Axl,” he snaps. “There was plenty then, well, I’m not gonna wear that to school.”

 

“After the stunt you pulled yesterday, it’d be in your best interest to mind your manners a bit more,” Mike cautions him. “Look, I take your point. They look like crap on you, but we don’t have the money to get you new clothes, it’s as simple as that. So if you can buy your own clothes, I don’t care what you get. But if you can’t, that’s what there is,” he points to the clothes on the floor. “And about yesterday, you’re grounded Anders.”

 

Anders glares at the discarded clothes on the floor, hating it. Growing up only wearing hand me down’s is bad enough, especially when you even have to wear your younger brothers, so as soon as Anders is on his own and has a job, he vows to never buy second hand again.

  
The end

 

Please comment, The Cricket is hungry, and wants everyone to read both One Word at a Time as well as  the Christmas Advent series. 


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